


Alëä

by Cân Cennau (cancennau)



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alien Mythology/Religion, Established Relationship, Fictional Religion & Theology, Other, Prayer, Religious Discussion, and they get to cuddle, essentially i use these two gays to talk about a religion i made up, which is honestly the most important part
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-17
Updated: 2018-08-17
Packaged: 2019-06-28 20:47:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15714798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cancennau/pseuds/C%C3%A2n%20Cennau
Summary: Cardassia's newly-found freedom also sees a boost of those engaging with acts of worship and religion. Elim catches Kelas in a private moment, and learns more about his spouse's background.





	Alëä

_“_ _Al_ _ëä_ _,_ _ūmarh-ða-_ _sema-_ _nëätsach,_ _al_ _ëä, sūðn-ðūä-_ _sëäma-_ _n_ _ë_ _ūäng...”_

The soft sound of melodic chanting reached Elim’s ears as he entered his home, and he set down his coat and scarf, ears prickling in interest. It’s not that any kind of song in the house was unusual – Kelas liked to turn on the radio when they came home – but the specific chanting reminded him of... something _spiritual_. The tune seemed to come from the sitting room, and Elim followed it carefully, lightly stepping into the room and peering around. It took him a moment to notice Kelas kneeling on a mat on the floor, a plain bowl of water in front of them, and another moment to realise it was Kelas who was singing. He watched from the doorway as Kelas dipped their head low, chanting in a beautiful melodic pattern as they dipped their fingers in the water, and drew intricate patterns across their face and arms with it. It was ritualistic, in a sense that Elim had not experienced before, although Tolan’s practice was similar. Perhaps it was a form of prayer?

Elim was aware of the differing religious practice of Enðarh, where Kelas was raised, but Kelas doing anything explicitly religious was in and of itself an oddity. He had in fact expected their practices to die out following the genocide carried out by the Central Belt government against their people and practices, but then again the Hebetian Way had survived, and that was just as old and persecuted. Leaving Kelas to their ritual, Elim ducked into the kitchen, and was immediately hit by the scent of fresh cooked food – Kelas had evidently made dinner before they begain their ritual, and Elim could smell the _chachell_ noodles and _m_ _ū_ _jnna_ set under cloths on the table. Setting his parcel on the side, Elim began putting on the kettle and preparing two cups for tea, the quiet, pensive atmosphere present in the house suiting a gentle brew rather than the bitterness of _channarh_ or fish juice.

The gentle chanting from the next room came to a slow stop just as Elim put the tea in to steep. He kept an ear out, heard the slight splash of water as Kelas got up, the scrape of the wooden bowl against the floor, and the clack of their toe-claws as they entered the kitchen. Elim offered a smile as Kelas approached and poured the bowl into the recycler, a smile Kelas returned in kind.

“ _Đ_ _ūrha,_ ” Kelas smiled, setting the bowl down and placing one hand on Elim’s lower back. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“You were in the middle of chanting.” Elim replied, leaning into Kelas’ touch. “I did not want to disturb your... prayer?”

“Not quite a prayer. A... meditation?” Kelas frowned for a moment. “It’s a Cheðaite thing. We call it _jūëmma-alūëä._ I’m not certain if there’s a Kardasi name for it.”

“It looked fairly peaceful.”

“It was. It helps... not necessarily clear the mind, but restores focus. It’s a ritual practice – brings you into alighnment with spiritual planes.”

“I didn’t know you were religious.”

“I’m not. At least, not in the way you’re thinking.”

“I see.” Elim took the cups of tea, and moved them over to the table, setting them by the plates. “Perhaps you can tell me about you religion-but-not-religion over dinner?”

“If you’d like. But let me eat first – religious discussions should never be undertaken on an empty stomach” Kelas sat down at the table, and began divvying up the food into their respective bowls. For the first five or ten minutes, their chatter lingered on light topics – work, arts, whatever caught their fancy and was not too deep. The food was lovely, as it always was when Kelas cooked, and Elim complimented them on it once he had finished, and laughing at the slight blush that graced Kelas’ cheeks whenever they were complimented. The plates and cups went into the recycler, and Elim opened his parcel to reveal desert – lychee _tsȳūmg nannare-pha,_ a fusion of Human and Cheðaite cooking that Kelas was particularly fond of. They took their dessert into the sitting room, where they were able to sit next to each other in comfort. It was as he was scraping up the last remnants of lychee juice and _neşte_ syrup that Kelas leaned back, hands on belly, and eyed Elim with some trepadation.

“What do you know about our religion?”

Elim finished off the last spoonful of his dessert, and frowned thoughtfully. “Not much,” he admitted, placing his spoon and plate on the low table. “I assumed it would be much like mine. Scriptures, some form of spiritual presence...”

“Hmm...” Kelas paused for a moment. “Well, we don’t have holy scriptures for one.”

“You don’t?”

“No. That is to say... we do not have a set text that we learn about divinity. We have written our dates and details of our religious practice, but they are not binding. They’re more like... a tourist guide.”

Elim smiled, amused. “Do they by any chance point the reader to the nearest good bars?”

“Hush, you.” Kelas elbowed him, and he laughed. “They show you the nearest shrines, what is ordinary practice, and tell you about the Beyond or the Deep Dark, depending on what area you’re reading about.”

“The Beyond? Deep Dark?”

“You know them as the Vinculum. It’s our spiritual plane, and where we seek... knowledge. Enlightenment. We go in looking for answers for questions we have not yet asked.”

“Ah.” Elim remembered both times he ended up in the Vinculum – the weird dream-like world which seemed to tell him everything and nothing all at once. “The Vinculum is a spiritual place for you?”

“Yes. Or perhaps, spiritual _pla_ _ces._ There’s rather a lot of academic debate as to whether the Vinculum’s we experience are one vinculic plane, or several planes, or perhaps several entirely seperate phenomena.”

“I should’ve expected a mind like yours would turn to a religion with an active academic base.” Elim laughed. “It suits you, I think.”

“You think that’s active academia – wait until you find out about our denominations.” Kelas laughed, a little self-depreciatingly. “You have some who access the Deep Dark in the sea, some in our rainforest, some who access both, some who access neither, some who think one entrance to the Deep Dark is lesser than the other, or is completely false...”

“That sounds distinctly chaotic.”

“Honestly, I think the only thing that links us as a coherent religion is that we agree there are no gods for us and that the Beyond is something in the mirror planes.”

“Hmm.” Elim was silent for a little while. “I knew you found the Vinculum- or rather brought it to the attention of us Centralites- but I had not know it was spiritually important for you.”

Kelas sighed, and for the first time during the discussion they looked pained. “I had not intended for it to become public knowledge. Limor’s discovery that transporter technology could access it was... a violation. I know there are some back home that feel it was traitorous to reveal its existence in the first place...”

“Kelas, _no._ ” Elim turned, and took Kelas’ hands in his own. “Our people were dying – mine as well as yours. You made a decision to save lives.”

“But I inadvertently exposed an important part of our practice to someone who misused it! I should’ve been more careful – it was my work that meant you were trapped in there the second time-”

“Limor’s actions are not your own, Kelas.” Elim leant forward and pressed his lips to Kelas’ forehead spoon. “Ease your mind, old friend. You did your best.”

“I try my best to believe that.” Kelas replied softly. Elim nudged at Kelas’ face until he was able to give his spouse a proper kiss, gentle and reassuring.

“You’re a good person, dear old thing.” he murmured as they broke apart. “You gave up much to save our people. Had you been to the Vinculum before?”

“Once.” To Elim’s relief, Kelas began to laugh. “I wasn’t meant to be in there.”

“Tell me?” Elim leaned back into a more comfortable position on the settee. Kelas settled back too, cuddling up underneath his arm with a slight smile.

“I guess I should start by mentioning that I was raised a Lachmȳrh Cheðaite.” they began. “We’re the denomination that access the Deep Dark through the sea – through a crevice in the ice floor. That’s why I was... meditating with sea water earlier.”

“By crevice, you mean the Ðūrhamg-Lūächmȳrh?” Elim asked. “We went there to see the whales once.”

“We did. Did you notice how part of the sea was darker than the rest?”

“It was black season, Kelas – everything was dark.”

Kelas snorted. “Alright, don’t be snipy. Well, the crevice was beneath us, and the whales live in it for most of the year. We Lachmȳrh Cheðaites aim to make the dive into it at least once in our lives.”

“Dive?” Elim frowned. “Kelas, that crevice must be hundreds of metres deep.”

“The entrance is about ninety _lechselman_ deep which is... about two hundred and thirty-ish metres?”

“And the bottom of the crevice?”

“I don’t think anyone’s ever reached the bottom. We tend to just swim until we see our guide whale.”

“So... your people swim into a dark cavern hundreds of metres beneath the surface, until you find a very specific whales among a contingent of other whales that live in it, so you can find... enlightenment? Kelas, do your people have a death wish?”

Kelas laughed brightly. “Probably! But don’t look at me like that – we have to go through years of training before we’re allowed to dive.”

“And you trained for it?”

“Yes. I trained with my brother, Mäūë – a nickname, before you ask-”

“I did wonder where your people’s prediliction for unfathomably long names had gone.” Elim quipped, and Kelas elbowed him.

“ _Hush_.”

“I’m sorry, dear.”

Kelas snorted wryly. “No, you’re not. Anyway, I trained with him. He wanted to work as a diver in Ðūrhamg-Lūächmȳrh, and when he was twenty or so, he got an induction as a noviate of the Lachmȳrh High Order. I was very religious and very jealous, so I insisted on joining his training, so I could follow in his footsteps. I was fifteen.”

“They would let you dive at fifteen?”

“Of course not – us Lachmȳrh Cheðaites do have _some_ sense of safety.”

“Says the sect that dives into a deep dark sea cavern in search of spiritual whales.”

“ _Safely_ dives in, thank you. It was another four years before my brother made his first dive – we sailed to _Marh_ _ð-_ _Pha-Lech,_ and made an event of it. It was special – your first dive is always special. and he wanted me to dive with him, so we could have our first dive together. But they wouldn’t let me dive.”

Elim frowned. “But you did the training.”

“I did but...” Kelas sighed. “Well, lets just say that I wasn’t the right _shape_. Mäūë was... thinner. Taller. Shaped like a Gul. I was his short, fat brother. They didn’t believe that I’d done the training with him, even though Mäūë fought them long and hard about it.”

“Kelas...” Elim tightened the arm around Kelas’ shoulder, and pressed a kiss to their forehead. Kelas gave him a slight smile.

“I’m ok, _ð_ _ūrha_. It’s in the past. It hurt me at the time – I was in a right state. I got to accompany my parents in the boat to watch him dive, and I was so very angry and upset, watching him go. I didn’t even want to talk to him after he resurfaced.”

“I can only imagine the frustration you felt.”

“Mmm. Mäūë understood, and left me be, but our parents did not understand. They sat me down and told me I was ruining my brother’s special day. We had a spat, and I stormed out. Well, there aren’t many places you can go on a tiny island, so I ended up at the shrine, where we had sailed from for Mäūë to dive...”

“Don’t tell me...”

“I was angry, and made a daft decision to dive on my own, to prove myself. You’re supposed to only dive when there are two other divers present, but I convinced myself I could do it alone. I rented a sea-kayak and suit for a night-time sail, borrowed a rebreather-”

“ _Borrowed?”_

“I gave it back later! I got what I needed, then went out onto the sea and dived in. Swam down, found my guide whale, and went into the Deep Dark.”

Elim whistled. “Kelas Parmak, you do surprise me sometimes.” he laughed. “Here’s you, diving into a dangerous underwater crevice, and yet you’re on my back if I so much as hold a fork incorrectly.”

“I am _not_ that bad.” But Kelas was laughing too, and they giggled like school children for a few moments, before Kelas sobered somewhat. “My brother, however, was not impressed with my decision.”

“I should guess not. You told him?”

“No – he saw that I’d left our rental house, and followed me. Once he realised exactly what I intended to do, he gathered up his diving gear and followed me onto the sea. He dived in and pulled me out of the crevice.”

“Not happy, I presume?”

“Very much not happy. Very worried, and fairly angry too. He promised not to tell our parents, but I also got one hell of a tongue-lashing. That I deserved, mind. But for me, what I saw down there was worth it.”

“What did you see?” Elim asked, then backtracked. “I mean, I know it would’ve been deeply personal, as it was for my two times in the Vinculum, so if it’s too personal-”

“No, it’s ok.” Kelas smiled at him, and leant up to kiss him lightly. “I trust you.”

“A dangerous decision, that.”

“More dangerous than diving into a sea crevice in search of ghostly whales?”

“Well...”

Kelas laughed. “I trust you anyway. My experience was probably not like yours – the Deep Dark gives you knowledge in a way that you’ll accept it. I went in expecting what I heard in the stories, and got what I expected.”

“And I went in expecting nothing, and got something wholly unexpected.”

“Exactly. I dived, and swam for what felt like forever. It was some time before I found my guide, but I followed them under the ice, and into a... kind of underwater library. Scrolls and stone tablets everywhere. I swam around, following my guide until I found... well, I’m not entirely certain _what_ I found.”

“Describe it?”

“It was like... a holoimage, but made out of stone. It shimmered like light, but looked like a stone... relief? It was of Saphäūs-Rhäū-Mäjūrh – the healer, you know?”

“Yes. They were from Bajor, no? They were an assassin...”

“Then became a healer after they too visited the Deep Dark. Well, the relief was of them carrying _phan-ph_ _äë_ _rhna_ flowers and tending to the dead, during the Hebetian Crisis. As I swam towards them, the relief... changed? Changed perspective, so that the flowers were being offered to me. I took the flowers, and the whole library burst into bloom.”

“It sounds beautiful.”

“It was. I didn’t get to see any other visions, though - Mäūë pulled me out soon afterwards.” Kelas sighed. “I wondered what else I might have seen had I stayed, but... perhaps it was for the best. It was enough to change me irrevocably – the next morning I told my parents I wanted to become a doctor.”

“The perfect religious son now wants to smash all societal norms?” Elim grinned. “That sounds much more like you.”

“Doesn’t it just?” Kelas smiled. “And... well, you already know the rest.”

“Mmm.” Elim paused for a moment. “You’re right – it was very different to mine.”

“Oh?”

“I can’t remember much of my first time – I remember meeting Julian, but not much else. My second time... I kept trying to find the Federation. I had to find Julian. But he would vanish, like smoke...”

“Elim...” Kelas patted his belly in a comforting gesture, and Elim smiled a little.

“It’s alright. I lost him in a sea of strangers, but when I awoke, I found my father. I spoke to him, then watched as those I lost... passed by, in a parade of some sort.” Elim paused. “I saw betrayal too. That’s how I knew Pythas and Limor were not to be trusted – you know by now Pythas was the one who ordered my entrapment.”

“I do.” Kelas sighed, and slumped into Elim’s side. “I wish Limor had not learnt how to access the Deep Dark. I wish I had not told him of its existence.”

“Kelas, let’s not have this argument again.” Elim cuddled them close. “It was not your fault. We trusted them – both Pythas and Limor. You couldn’t have known.”

“I...” Kelas let their head drop onto Elim’s shoulder. “Perhaps. Let’s not talk of them any more, hmm?”

“Of course. Shall we see what’s on the casts? Perhaps there’s a film...”

Elim turned on the monitor, and they stayed like that, curled together, as the film Elim chose murmured in the background, it’s orchestral score soothing hurts and drawing them into another story.


End file.
